When color development is carried out after a silver halide photographic light-sensitive material is exposed to light, an oxidized aromatic primary amine developing agent reacts with a dye forming coupler to form a color image. In this process, color reproduction by a subtractive process is generally utilized. In accordance with this process, dye images of cyan, magenta and yellow, which are complement colors of red, green and blue, respectively, are formed in order to produce images of red, green and blue. For example, phenol derivatives or naphthol derivatives are mainly used as cyan color image forming couplers.
However, the color images formed from conventionally employed phenol derivatives or naphthol derivatives have some problems with respect to durability. For example, color images formed from the 2-acylaminophenol cyan couplers as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,367,531 and 2,423,730 generally have inferior fastness to heat. Color images formed from the 2,5-diacylaminophenol cyan couplers as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,369,929 and 2,772,162 generally have inferior fastness to light, and color images formed from 1-hydroxy-2-naphthamide cyan couplers generally have inferior fastness to both light and heat.
Further, with respect to the 1-hydroxy-2-acylaminocarbostyryl cyan couplers as described in Japanese Patent Application (OPI) No. 104333/81, spectral absorption characteristics of color images formed therefrom are not preferable with respect to color reproduction, while the color images formed are superior in fastness to both light and heat.